Ask Slashdot: Why Aren't Techies Improving The World? 537
Slashdot reader marmot7 isn't impressed by "the latest app that solves some made up problem. I'm impressed by apps that solve real problems..."
I don't feel that developers, sys admins, finance people, even policy wonks focus on the problems that we need to solve to have a healthy functioning society. It seems like it's mostly about short-term gain and not much about making the world better. That may be just the way the market works.
Is it that there's no profit to be made in solving the most important problems? I'm puzzled by that as I would think that a good solution to an important problem could find some funding from somewhere but maybe government, for example, won't take investment risks in that way?
Is there a systematic bias that channels technology workers into more profitable careers? (Or stunning counter-examples that show technology workers are making the world a better place?) Leave your answers in the comments. Why aren't geeks doing more to improve the world?
Is it that there's no profit to be made in solving the most important problems? I'm puzzled by that as I would think that a good solution to an important problem could find some funding from somewhere but maybe government, for example, won't take investment risks in that way?
Is there a systematic bias that channels technology workers into more profitable careers? (Or stunning counter-examples that show technology workers are making the world a better place?) Leave your answers in the comments. Why aren't geeks doing more to improve the world?
And.. (Score:4, Insightful)
What are the important problems we are supposed to be solving that we aren't?
Hackaday Prize (Score:5, Informative)
Check out the Hackaday prize [hackaday.io], over at Hackaday.io.
For three years running, Hackaday has hosted the contest with a $100,000 first prize and a handful of $10,000 prizes.
Several of the prize categories would be appropriate for solving world problems, such as "citizen scientist", "automation", and "assistive technologies". (The other two categories are catch-alls which could also contain world-bearing solutions.
Many of the projects are high-concept. There are about 1000 entries this year, so you will get a wide range of possible project including some risible ones.
But there are definitely some strong entries this year.
I follow the Automatic Digital Microscope [hackaday.io] project, which hopes to automate (and speed up) the detection of tuberculosis in 3rd world countries.
The Electrospinning machine [hackaday.io] looks really interesting, could possibly become the next "3d printer" appliance for hackers.
The very high accuracy tilt sensor [hackaday.io] is possibly a new technology (I hadn't seen or heard of it before).
If you want to find techies improving the world, you might include Hackaday.io (specifically: the prize entries) in your search.
If you want to improve the world yourself, you might consider coming up with a project and entering the prize next year.
If you want to *help* improve the world, you might consider joining a Hackaday.io team that's entered for the prize.
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Check out the Hackaday prize [hackaday.io], over at Hackaday.io.
Actually, you don't even have to get too clever to save lives. In early 2015, the South Pacific country of Vanuatu was devastated by cyclone Pam, a category 5 storm that severely damaged almost half the country [theatlantic.com]. (Full disclosure: the UNICEF photos are mine.). In spite of some islands being completely denuded [es-static.us] of shelter, only 11 people died.
The people of Vanuatu deal with an average of 1.5 cyclones every year, but this was an unique event. There had never been a storm of this intensity measured in the count
Re:Or (Score:4, Informative)
Alternatively we could invent a smart content filter that allows us to simply not hear idiot conspiracy nutters that are SO batshit crazy that there's an exact zero chance that any of their "predictions" can ever come true that we can put more focus on the real problems.
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Let's break down, point by point, what he dumped on:
That there is an elite is not debatable. Also called the 1%, they have HALF the money in the world. If anyone should be doing great things with tech and everything else, it is the 1%. End Of Thread.
Score one for "batshit crazy"
Techies ARE improving the world (Score:5, Insightful)
The headline asks a question that is based on a false premise. Techies are doing more than anyone to improve the world. We have gone 70 years without a major war. Why? Two reasons, better communications and nuclear weapons. Both of these are because the techies that built the Internet, launched the comsats, and split the atom. Today, the Internet is bringing literacy and prosperity to the third world. Better solar cells and windmills are bringing us clean energy. Wikipedia is compiling the world's knowledge, and Google is giving us a way to search it instantly.
All of this is being done by us nerds. Who else is doing as much to create a better world? Lawyers? Journalists? Politicians? I don't think so.
Re:Techies ARE improving the world (Score:5, Insightful)
We have gone 70 years without a major war. Why?
Because politicians managed to avoid nuclear exchange a few times through the careful use of diplomacy. That, and global trade.
Why, just since the end of the Cold War, techies have supplied us with smarter weapons and drones so we can kill lots more people while pretending that we're not actually engaging in warfare, the ability to perform wholesale surveillance on our own populace (both in the public and private sector!), and a whole lot of snake-oil security theatre machines to remind us all to be scared.
Thanks, techies!
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Global trade is dependant on us techies, networks to make trading easier. Technology in shipping and transportation...
The same for diplomacy. The ability that diplomats and world leaders could call each other if there is an issue or travel and meet each other in less than 24 hours is amazing.
Re:Techies ARE improving the world (Score:4, Insightful)
The same for diplomacy. The ability that diplomats and world leaders could call each other if there is an issue or travel and meet each other in less than 24 hours is amazing.
Indeed. When Kaiser Wilhelm left for a holiday in July of 1914, history may have turned out very different if he took along a cellphone.
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LIKE sYRIA
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It was a "major" war. please use your quotes right. There is a feature in computers called copy and paste to make sure you correctly get the text segment it said.
"We have gone 70 years without a major war."
Compared to WWI and WWII we haven't been in a major war, we have been in a bunch of minor wars, police actions...
While we criticize the mess we are in with the Middle East and a lot of of it was due to the US and Soviets playing politics in that area and putting rather questionable people in power over t
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Compared to WWI and WWII there have been hardly any major wars in history.
The Thirty Years War (1618-1648) [wikipedia.org] killed a greater fraction of Europe's population than WW1. The Mongol expansion in the thirteenth century, especially their conquest of China, also killed more.
Re: Techies ARE improving the world (Score:5, Informative)
Please count the number of casulaties that have fallen in those 'minor' wars for the resources that make our financial elite even more rich than they already are, and then tell me again it's only 'minor'.
It's worth doing that exercise [ourworldindata.org]. The author of the linked webpage claims about 22 million war deaths including genocide and non state-based warfare from after the end of the Second World War through to 2007. That's about what the First World War killed in four years (not counting the 1918 influenza epidemic which was greatly expedited by the war). And of course, the Second World War killed at least three times as many people in an eight year period.
If we look at per capita, war deaths in the current period of peace are even more pronounced. The Second World War is thought to have killed at least 3% of the people alive at the time. That would be well over 200 million people now. We are nowhere near that.
Do the numbers. See for yourself.
Re:Techies ARE improving the world (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think you're trying to grok in good faith.
You addressed his comments about nuclear weapons in a dismissive way without overwhelming evidence on your side.
You ignored the comments about google, wikipedia, literacy, prosperity, solar cells, and wind mills.
You straw manned him by suggesting his position was that technology has already saved the world, which you followed up by using to paint him as an extremist (the anti-luddite).
So not only do you begin from questionable premises, but you don't really read to understand.
Wars depend where you are in the cycle of history. (Score:4, Interesting)
The world has a history pattern of how wars work. Follow along for a minute before saying I am off the wall. Its all in pattern analysis. I am paraphrasing from the book "The Fourth Turning" by Strauss and Howe.
The world works on a 80 year cycle (I'm skipping the generational stuff and going right to the wars.). The wars reflect what part of the cycle you are in.
First turning wars occur after the last big war and settle any left over issues from the last big war. Example: Queen Anne's War, War of 1812, Korean War. No major changes to the world dynamic. People are happy to settle things down for a while. These are often proxy wars between the winners of the last major conflict.
Second turning wars go no where fast, drag out for a while and are a quagmire. Example: English Civil war, King George's war, Spanish-American War, Vietnam, Afghanistan (Russian intervention). These wars tend to be guerilla wars, don't get a lot done and no one is quite sure why they are being fought. These are potrayed as police actions or proxy wars (or both).
Third Turning Wars are preparatory wars for the fourth turning. These wars are based on new conflicts that did not exist when the last big war occurred. Examples: French and Indian Wars, Mexican War, World War I, Operation Desert Storm. These wars are fought but don't fundamentally change the underpinnings of the world structure. They do point to how the next major war will unfold. These are often interventions or peace keeping expeditions.
Fourth Turning Wars are decisive and to the end. Example: War of the Roses, Armada of Triumph, King Philips War, Bacon's Rebellion, King Williams War, Glorious Revolution, American Revolution, American Civil War, World War II. During the fourth turning wars are brutal and to the end. Have any new powerful weapons you were afraid to use before? Now is the time to use them.
It is all in pattern analysis. There have been major conflicts, wars and political realignments going on throughout the last 15 years (starting in 2001). The number of governments that have fallen or realigned during that time is breath taking. Europe, the Middle East and Africa are all coming apart at the seams. China and Russia are working very hard to keep their countries battened down hard. The US has its own troubles, notably a big push towards fascism (government take over of corporations and oppression of minorities fits the bill).
Everything is pointing toward large countries being willing to see how far they can push the envelope on any problem they encounter, which leads to larger wars. I expect there to be an expansion of the middle eastern conflict into Europe, Africa and Asia before it calms down again. Case in point: If Russia runs out its currency reserves next year (and it is on track to), it won't have the money to do anything and the Russian state will have to lash out or pull back and lick its wounds. Right now the posture that Russia has is not toward licking its wounds. If Russia lashes out and starts something major things will get serious quickly in Asia and Europe. And Russia will drive it until it runs out of money or collapses either way is not good for Asia, Europe and the World.
Will it unwind this way? I don't know. But I do see something on the horizon that ain't pretty.
Technology is a tool (Score:3)
Like every tool it is up to the individual on how to use it. A technology designed for great good can also be used for great evil. The internet allows us to communicate with people around the world and openly share ideas and make people realize that in other areas they are human being too. Or you can use internet to spread you regional biases and hate across a broader area and recruit others to join your hatred group.
Also every technology comes with a trade-off. That smaller communication device means you
like what? (Score:5, Insightful)
What could be solved by tech? And would people use that tech?
If you don't have an answer, throwing money at it won't make it happen. If you do, you'll likely have an answer why it isn't being done.
This topic hurts my head (Score:2)
Re: like what? (Score:3)
Why haven't geeks solved all the world's problems yet? Perhaps because they have been busy solving the world's problems.
For example:
--invented and built out mobile telephony, improving personal safety and convenience
--built global data network (the Internet) that continues to enlighten populations and shake repressive governments
--invented gps sats and provided cheap handheld receivers
--invented geographic information systems (which allows not just MapQuest, but Yelp, gas buddy, and the self-driving car, am
Re:like what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:like what? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is exactly how I would have answered. Capitalism creates way more problems then it solves.
This is debatable. I'd say the culture around capitalism (and perhaps more accurately, the "myths" capitalism tells about itself) are more problematic than capitalism itself.
In a balanced society and economy which mixes various economic elements more freely, capitalism can be a useful element. It's when we put capitalism up on a pedestal as the "best" system or the "only" one that is an appropriate component in a free society that we run into trouble.
There are many cases where capitalism can address problems that a more "managed" approach through government or whatever would be difficult, and there are plenty of cases where the creativity of capitalist enterprises can solve "problems" that people didn't even think were "problems" until capitalism generated a better way.
It's the side effects, though, that are more worrisome. Capitalism breeds a "game" mentality where everything in life is about money, profit, eternal growth, etc. It creates illusions like our modern commercial economy based on "newness" and disposable goods. Contrary to what capitalism claims, these are not necessarily just "human nature," as there were lots of historical societies with different organizations and different values.
It's not so much that capitalism is fundamentally flawed as that modern society's embrace of capitalism (to the exclusion of other values or possible economic components) hasn't yet found the most productive (and more ethical?) balance.
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Re:like what? (Score:5, Interesting)
I think I realised that the world had really changed about 10 years ago when I was vacationing in the south of Thailand. Standing on the beach on Koh Lanta at sunrise, I used my mobile to ring my mom back in the States and let her know that I was fine and hadn't even been in Bangkok during the previous day's coup d'état.
It was my first mobile phone, and I'd only bought it about 2 months earlier. One of the early Samusung flip-phones. I still have it, and it still works just fine for voice, SMS, and very primitive (text-only) web browsing.
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(Yeahyeah, probably doesn't mean shit to most of yas, but it was a bit of a Star Trek moment for me.)
Re:like what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't Venture Capital throwing money at a problem with the hope of solving it and making money? Why is throwing money at BeerMe, DriveMe, FeedMe, etc., a reasonable idea but throwing money at a more important problem not acceptable or likely to work?
Solving a problem does not inherently make you money. Creating a solution customers are willing and able to spend money on will make you money. By giving $10 to a starving poor person I could solve that hunger (at least temporarily), but I am unlikely to see a return on that "investment". Finding a way to make a better tasting ketchup, on the other hand, could make a lot of money, regardless of whether tastier ketchup is a more important than feeding starving people.
Venture capital is not charity. Wealthy people can certainly choose to start a foundation (like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) instead of investing in a VC firm if solving "important" problems is their goal. If they choose investing, however, return on investment is likely the goal.
There are a lot of VC funded companies solving very important problems, but the reason they were funded almost certainly was because they could show a potential return on investment. Social good could have been a factor, but very few companies (or possibly no companies) are funded by VC's as a charity case.
Re:Capitalism is charity (Score:2)
I would argue a tastier ketchup is worth more. People value it and are willing to pay for it which in return employees people to boot as well. A VC that attracts customers is worthy to the employees and the customers. All which re-invest the everyone else to help eliminate hunger as the trajectory and speed of the money supply being moved in the economy are signs of economic growth and everyone benefiting from it
You didn't starve tonight did you? Someone gave you food or the ingredients to make you food jus
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You're not making sense. What should venture capital be funding? I can probably give you a detailed explanation. But I don't see anything likely to actually work and be used that also isn't being developed.
If it clearly won't work, or people don't want to work that way, there's no point backing it. Making money isn't even part of this, since we has open source software and hardware that techies are making available to improve life.
So what is not being done here?
Re:like what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Technology isin't that important.
You mean technology like vaccines that wiped out smallpox, and will soon wipe out polio?
Smallpox has killed more people than all the war in history combined, including more than 300 million during the 20th century. That is six WW2s. That is important.
The problem with tech, is that once it is part of our lives, we no longer consider it "tech", and we take it for granted.
How old are you?
Old enough to have a smallpox vaccine scar on my arm. Old enough to remember polio killing people in America.
Re: like what? (Score:4, Interesting)
The OP is probably so young that he thinks fresh produce at the corner grocery store all winter long is 'normal'.
Decent roads. Fast vehicles. Electricity. Refrigeration. Perhaps plastics and cleaning/sealing tech to delay spoilage. It takes a lot of techs to get me a fresh, crisp cucumber in February.
Re:...too many people (Score:3, Funny)
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The fuck they arent.
Next you will say steel is not technology.
Or that ceramic is not technology.
Technology is the application of science to change the human environment. The use of fire is technology. The combination of iron and carbon to make steel is technology.
The purposeful introduction of viral protiens to sensitize a human immune system to viral infectious agents is technology.
Science enables technology.
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Technology and especially information technology is the focus on human power right now, and that power can be applied to better goals [...]
Technology is not the focus of human power right now, financial capital is. This is unlikely to ever change. Technology is simply a tool used by those with power (regardless of how much power they have) to achieve their goals. The percentage of technological advancement geared towards social good is directly proportional to the desire to enact social good by those who have financial capital.
When those with financial capital are more interested in solving the world's most important problems than they are in
Re:like what? (Score:5, Insightful)
And provide mobility for people with visual or physical impairment, eliminate drunk driving deaths and most of the deaths caused by driver error, too, dramatically reduce the delays caused by traffic lights, dramatically increase average road speed by reducing accidents and driving at faster speeds with shorter spacing between cars and speeding up more quickly when the car in front of you does, and dramatically increase fuel economy as a result of those other improvements.
Re: like what? (Score:2)
Ffs.
Really? So you consider the moved by windows ten to track, analyse, and control computer users throughout the world is warm and fuzzy do you?
Tying security updates to allowing yourself to be tracked?
Microsoft having a list of your applications as well as remote ability to block then from running?
Practically forcing this 'upgrade' on users who were trying to avoid it?
Yes. Seems so much more friendly to me..
At to the original and very stupid idea of this whole discussion... Just imagine the world without
Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed (Score:2)
Saying that folks aren't making apps that benefit a healthy, functioning, society is a useless statement without specifying what apps would achieve or work toward that goal. Additionally, smart phone apps can't really solve the world's real problems. Violence due to religious extremism isn't going to be negated by a phone app. An app that shows food shortages and food surpluses isn't going to fight world hunger unless someone will pay for the cheap surplus food and transportation.
In common cases where an
What software is needed? (Score:3)
In your opinion, what software does not exist, but would benefit society/the world if it did?
As Aziz Shamim put it... (Score:4, Insightful)
"SF tech culture is focused on solving one problem: What is my mother no longer doing for me?"
Not much world changing going on in that paradigm.
Big companies do put lots of money at trying to change the world (usually in a way that also benefits them) but rarely succeed.
You may be looking in the wrong place (Score:5, Insightful)
Most of us who entered science and academia did so to make the world a better place, and many of us are techies. You'd be amazed at home much coding and tech is required for pretty much every area of science today.
We're writing open source software to solve real problems in science and engineering. We're spending the last of our startups on open access for our papers because it's the right thing to do. We're contributing to open data repositories because sharing data makes all our work better. We're writing free content on blogs, code tutorials, and MOOCs for public outreach, because we view our roles as educators seriously.
Most people in academic endure years of low pay and job uncertainty as postdocs and entry-level faculty--and defer or postpone indefinitely having children and buying that starter home--rather than faster and better-paying paths in industry, IP law, and mathematical finance because we do want to make the world a better place, and we're actively working on it.
So, while I agree with your general feeling, take a look around, and you'll see more techies trying make a difference that you might have realized.
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Most of us who entered science and academia did so to make the world a better place, and many of us are techies. You'd be amazed at home much coding and tech is required for pretty much every area of science today.
We're writing open source software to solve real problems in science and engineering. We're spending the last of our startups on open access for our papers because it's the right thing to do. We're contributing to open data repositories because sharing data makes all our work better. We're writing free content on blogs, code tutorials, and MOOCs for public outreach, because we view our roles as educators seriously.
Most people in academic endure years of low pay and job uncertainty as postdocs and entry-level faculty--and defer or postpone indefinitely having children and buying that starter home--rather than faster and better-paying paths in industry, IP law, and mathematical finance because we do want to make the world a better place, and we're actively working on it.
So, while I agree with your general feeling, take a look around, and you'll see more techies trying make a difference that you might have realized.
I agree with you. On average, I find my techie friends are more informed and intellectually curious than any other group. I'd put them at about equal to my academic friends in this area. And I should have worded the question with more finesse, forseeing these sort of objections. There's all kinds of good work happening every single day but there's a lot of money and a lot of attention shined on the mundane. So much so that people are losing respect for "Silicon Valley" meaning the tech industry in general.
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Thanks for your reply. It's an interesting discussion, and indeed, I get a little fed up when even in academia, translational medicine morphs from meaning "translating theory into practice" to meaning "getting patents and making profitable startups." It's needed, but it can sometimes distort the field and culture when it becomes an ends and not a means.
I'm a little curious as to your definition of techie, because a lot of the discussion really boils down to how you define a techie.
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Exactly! This is why I work as a sysadmin to support science, instead of working as a sysadmin to support profit or entertainment. I've had to make this call a couple of times in my career, and so far I've chosen to stay on the side that improves the world. Not always an easy choice though, given the incentives of the short term profit side.
You don't even need an academic career to do this either, there is plenty of us that have trouble recruiting competent programmers or sysadmins because the pay isn't as
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That's my impression, too. There's a huge personal and financial cost associated with working to make the world a better place, even if your specific goal isn't controversial at all (developing medical devices in my case).
We see relatively few people working on these problems because we, as a society, value this work far less than almost every other pursuit (business, marketing, making weapons, etc). Maybe this illustrates that I'm not a very good person, but when I'm feeling down I wonder why I put myself
honestly (Score:2)
Why is a "stunning" example necessary? (Score:4, Insightful)
Is not the genius required to keep existing infrastructure stable and feed the pace of technological advancement enough?
Have we become so jaded to the incredibly fast rate of advancement that the everyday heroes who make this happen are not enough?
Are we so self-centered in the wealthy developed parts of the world that we can't see the benefits that the rapid decrease in the cost of anything less than the absolute cutting edge have brought to poorer parts of the world?
Pretty simple actually.... (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is cultural. We do not champion the production of things that enrich society in general, especially if they have no, or little, profit attached.
Speaking for myself, my whole resume as a Systems Engineer contains nothing organizations who either were directly involved in education, or served that market.. Those have been my sole employers. I've always been paid below market as an employee.
And I've always been looked at as an anomaly. Sometimes even derided. One time there was an offer that was $60,000 above what I was making. It was for a Fortune 10 company- which I turned down. Boy did I earn a high level of scorn from my friends and family who valued the paycheck over the work.
Am I the only one? I highly doubt it.
If you tally up the number of children that were educated by systems I designed- the number is conservatively above 7 million.
Was it worth it? You're goddamned right it was.
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Wow, you are one precious snowflake!
Guess what man - if that's how you value spending your life, then by all means do it; but why must you call anyone who chooses a different path a "problem"?
Also do you know what profit is? It's the result of doing what other people want you to do. And then you get to spend that profit on getting others to do what you want them to do. Profit is not evil. What it in fact represents is you doing the best you can at pleasing other people, of making their lives better. An
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So what do black children on the west side of Chicago need to do to get a good education and a decent system to support them? Interpretive dance? How will they please the people around them and get support?
What services do they have to offer? Things only get better for them when someone steps in to make things better- and there isn't much profit in that... Now is there?
That's the case for most education problems....
So I'll tell you what "man", if you can take your snowflaky ass out of the corporate offices
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Price (and indirectly, profit) is precisely an indicator of what society overall has decided enriches it. If people want it, they are willing to pay more for it.
If you feel society is not championing the things which would enrich it, that is an indication that your idea of "enrichment" deviates substantially from society's. Not that society is wron
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It's simple... companies that service education do not have the margin that other tech companies have. The schools have limited resources and limited ability to pay. Everything is done on a razor margin (assuming a competitive bid structure).
It comes back to value. Why was I paid below market? Because schools, as customers, could not support a salary over 150k.
Tech doesn't solve cultural problems (Score:4, Insightful)
Far too many people having too many babies in parts of the world that can't support those populations and thus the resulting strife and misery? Cultural problem.
Far too many parents being completely disengaged with their kids' education, or too dumb themselves to contribute to it? Cultural problem.
Sense of entitlement causing resentment instead of inspiring the creativity and productivity that comes without being raised in a state of feeling owed things? Cultural problem.
All sorts of ecological messes and resource shortages? Cultural - see first example. Persistent friction between modernity and retrograde medieval thinking, including blowing up pressure cooker bombs in NY (as we had again, tonight)? Cultural problem. There's plenty more in the way of examples. App developers suddenly deciding to stop trying to become financially stable and instead put their waking ours into
What does the OP actually envision, here? Since that wasn't even alluded to, he sounds just like the over-serious girl from (was it Animal House?): "I don't know how anyone can have a party [or was it a dance?] when there are hungry people in the world!"
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Far too many people having too many babies in parts of the world that can't support those populations and thus the resulting strife and misery? Cultural problem. Far too many parents being completely disengaged with their kids' education, or too dumb themselves to contribute to it? Cultural problem. Sense of entitlement causing resentment instead of inspiring the creativity and productivity that comes without being raised in a state of feeling owed things? Cultural problem. All sorts of ecological messes and resource shortages? Cultural - see first example. Persistent friction between modernity and retrograde medieval thinking, including blowing up pressure cooker bombs in NY (as we had again, tonight)? Cultural problem.
We can't even agree on what the problems are.....pretty much all the things you listed are controversial to some segment of society (often very large segments).
I solve the problems I'm PAID to solve. (Score:5, Insightful)
I have no obligation to sacrifice my unpaid free time simply because I have a set of skills.
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If it were convenient for you to bid your time to help solve a major world problem, would you be likely to get involved?
Would you want your full market value, or would you be willing to accept a discount in exchange for controlling your own work?
If you would be willing to accept a discount, how much would you consider?
Perhaps you have an alternative idea? For example, some kind of bonus based on the favorable evaluation of the results?
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Next, ask your mailman why your cable bill is so high....
Hard problems are hard. (Score:4, Insightful)
So what sorts of problems does the submitter think we should focus on? World hunger? Poverty? Disease? War?
These are very hard problems to solve. All of these have been around since the dawn of humanity, and nobody has come up with an all-encompassing solution yet.
The problems with the big problems are more than technological -- they're political. No amount of technology is going to be able to solve poverty in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (for example), when the government is corrupt and the rule of law and human rights aren't being observed. Even in a Western country like the United States, you can't fix poverty when many people blame the poor for their own situation and there is no political will to provide a minimal level of social assistance.
That said, where there is a political will, technology is already helping solve big problems. Solar cells are bringing inexpensive electricity to villages in poor countries. Software hoping with resource allocation helps aid agencies ensure they have food stocks of adequate quantities where they are needed most. Vaccines and modern medical technology are having a major impact on disease -- we've rid the world of smallpox, and we're really close to eradicating polio.
Hard problems are hard. I know we in technology like to think of ourselves as solving hard problems, but pervasive political problems are way bigger than what technology alone can resolve.
Yaz
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I agree with all this and that's sort of part of what I was getting at with my question. Some of the problems are market failures and there's no obvious way to directly profit from working on the problem so if we are going to spend money it'll likely be through the political process. . The government's likely to be the one investing in technology directed at these problems. Even if it's contractors doing the work, the funding comes from the government. Certain domains, such as military get plenty of resources, but other critical domains do not. I'm not even suggesting that our military spending is bad, by the way. I'll forever be grateful to ARPA (DARPA) for inventing the Internet. :-)
Yeah, but my point is more having to do with political will rather than a lack of monetary or technical resources. And some of the solutions don't even require technology -- just effort (and thus money).
As I pointed out, the political issues are greater than just that of political will. It requires all governments in all countries respect human rights, minority rights, and uphold the rule of law. It requires removing government corruption where it exists. And then it requires a ground-up push from The P
What do we need? (Score:5, Insightful)
Your question implies the following:
I'm not sure that any of these is strictly true, and I'm nearly positive that we'll only know most of those answers in hindsight.
How about race relations? There's no app for that. War? You can't solder-up a PCB that convinces governments to stop murdering each other's citizens over differences of opinion.
Speaking of governments, what would a "techie" solution to government oppression look like? We have Tor, cryptocurrencies, steganographic filesystems, and mobile devices that would destroy the data on them before giving it up to an intrusive search, and look at how governments react.
That said, how about some of the areas where technology absolutely has worked on big problems?
Do you think climate change is a big problem? Do you think that the amount of power consumed by information technology globally is a terrifying figure in the face of anthropogenic climate change? This is a problem we know how to fix in "tech," and we're working on it.
Deaths due to traffic accidents? Computer vision and distributed coordination algorithms are at the core of self-driving automobiles.
How about 3D-printed prosthetics, or the medical industry in general? Data processing revolutionized drug research and genome work. Sure, there are more people doing silly apps than designing new systems for doing drug interaction simulation because one requires connections to established research labs, years of work, very expensive studies of efficacy, a decade of postsecondary education to have the domain-specific knowledge, and a hardware budget that runs into the millions; the other requires a crappy $300 laptop and some free software.
If there's a big problem out there that you want solved, either put up, pay up, or shut up.
Um... (Score:5, Insightful)
So, marmot7...why aren't you working to make the world a much better place, if it's so easy? What makes all the other techies responsible for improving your world in the manner you think is most correct?
Hard problems have no simple answers. Being a techie is not like being Gandalf the fucking Magician...the reason that there's so much discussion around hard problems is that, despite the efforts of many, a solution has not yet been found, and being a techie doesn't grant some mystical ability to solve any problem on command.
This is not a moral failing of others, it's just the fact that these are hard problems. And the fact that you don't live in a perfect utopia is not because everyone else is greedy, lazy, selfish or short-sighted. Get over yourself, kid.
Easy answer (Score:3)
Most people don't give a crap about their fellow human.
People think mostly of the benefit to themselves, then their families, their race, their country, their pets, and rarely do they care anything about a random human especially in Africa or some other place. It's human nature, at best some humans care about their family or country more than themselves but mainly this is the order. They actively try to eliminate and discredit anyone who dares care about random humans. That's just the way it is. Humans.
Re: (Score:2)
You're erroneously generalizing from yourself to other humans.
I believe in working to make things better. (Score:5, Interesting)
Gee I dunno... (Score:2)
What could possibly bias people toward careers that offer a comfortable life instead of poverty!?!?
oh fuck you (Score:5, Interesting)
But no, everyone knows open source is about the money.
Re: (Score:2)
you mean... (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean why don't techies work on things like giving everybody on the globe to access all the books ever written, listen to lectures from the best minds on the planet, communicate with anybody anywhere, access financial services across the globe, learn how to grow food better, get highly accurate and detailed maps and satellite photos for free (e.g., for improving agriculture), buy and sell pretty much anything from anywhere, create software that allows anybody anywhere to analyze scientific data and write software?
Indeed there is. In a free society with free citizens, we let individuals decide, and vote for, what they find useful. That kind of "voting" is carried out using money: if you produce something that I find useful, I give you money for it; if you produce crap that I don't want, I don't give you money for it. That way, people who produce useful stuff get rewarded and get the resources to produce more useful stuff, while the people who produce crap get fewer resources allocated to them. Does that answer your question? How else would you like things to work?
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed there is. In a free society with free citizens, we let individuals decide, and vote for, what they find useful. That kind of "voting" is carried out using money: if you produce something that I find useful, I give you money for it; if you produce crap that I don't want, I don't give you money for it. That way, people who produce useful stuff get rewarded and get the resources to produce more useful stuff, while the people who produce crap get fewer resources allocated to them. Does that answer your question? How else would you like things to work?
Except that not everybody has the same vote. And this exactly explains why so many techs work on stuff which is not really useful to the average person at all: They work to make the people who have most of the money (almost all the votes) even richer. This is the reason why advertisement which has only small usefulness to the overall society is so big and basically defines what the internet and mobile industry is today: a huge spying machine with free but only marginally useful content served with lots of
Which problems? (Score:4, Informative)
Keeping in touch and up to date with old friends? Social networks solved a lot of that.
Having visual conversations with distant relatives? Video chat solved that.
Getting lost? GPS navigation solved that.
Finding answers to factual questions? Search engines (kinda) solved that.
Giving public platforms to ordinary people? Blogs solved that.
Just try going back and living in the early 90's and see how you like it. Techies have addressed tons of real world problems, and come up with at least partial solutions to a lot of them. Naturally many remain and some new ones have arisen, we don't live in a utopia, but it's not like they've been doing nothing.
Re:Which problems? (Score:5, Funny)
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Giving public platforms to ordinary people? Blogs solved that.
This is actually an enormously important change that's taken place over the past 10-20 years. In the past, you'd need permission from "the powers that be" to get your voice (or creative works) out there into the public eye. Today, if you have the motivation, pretty much anyone can get public (and global) notice.
This is both good and bad (village idiots are now given attention to on a nation scale, whereas previously they've be ignored), but I think that overall its quite a positive shift.
Re: (Score:2)
Simple answer is money, always has been (Score:2)
If society woke up one day and decided that something other than money would be used to determine relative value, this argument wouldn't exist. Until then, people are going to be driven by money -- for survival at a basic level, but then for lifestyle and status improvement as the levels rise. They're going to do what they think can make them the most money so they're not out on the street or eating macaroni and cheese for most dinners.
It's all the same problem:
- During the last late 90s dotcom bubble, peop
Laconic summary (Score:2)
"Why aren't techies improving the world?
Fuck you. Pay me.
Techie are fixing world at same rate it was broken (Score:2)
I think the expectation that the application of tech will fix something that's wrong with the world very quickly is a big part of the problem.
How long have humans been dumping garbage into the environment? Why would you expect that recycling, composting, reclamation and other technologies will not only stop the poisoning of the environment and clean up the current mess in the order of years?
Same thing for CO2 in the atmosphere. We've been burning increasing amounts of fossil fuels for 130 years or so, why
Grow up kid! (Score:2)
Consider PRISM (Score:2)
Could that lack of ability start before ever entering the private sector?
Study hard, pay up or a full scholarship still based on academic results. Get guided to a getting a security clearance just to have access to very advanced crypto, maths? Trips to conferences, talks, corporate funding, gov projects. Any good job later will need clearance, get it early, see the world while still in academia? That security clearance that opened academic doors is
Some are, some aren't (Score:3)
In this respect, techies are like anybody else. Some are out to help save the world, or at least make it a better place, and some aren't. It's not the tech that makes the savior, it's the person.
The same can be said about:
- finance folks (microcredit vs subprime mortgages)
- engineers (postwar reconstruction vs weapons)
- architects (affordable housing designs vs Trump towers)
- builders (habitat for humanity vs suburban subdivisions)
to name a few examples.
easy (Score:2)
because the useless short term gain finance people control the whole mess for now !
i reject the premise (Score:2)
Hey look, it's Slashdot concern trolling their readers again!
I reject the premise.
"Why are software developers working on this trivial Internet thing rather than solving world hunger?"
It's the Von Mises knowledge problem, aka the economic calculation problem. You don't know what the most important problems to solve are because you (and by "you" I especially mean "any government body") can't see the future. One person can only be an expert on their own life, not everyone else's lives. You don't necessarily k
Ridiculous (Score:2)
This is the most vacuous rhetoric I've ever seen here.
With no definition of what would satisfy making the world better and how tech isn't doing it, these words are basically meaningless. I could just as easily ask why aren't the medical, financial, media, or any other field not making the world a better place. Seriously, consider:
"I don't feel that doctors, nurses, administrators, even policy wonks focus on the problems that we need to solve to have a healthy functioning society. It seems like it's mostly a
Cancerous economics = bad financial models (Score:2)
Good question, but I can't write the book this morning unless some techie gives me a time warp machine. If I only had the focus and sustained motivation, then it would probably take me several months.
Short answer is that most of them are nice people and would like to, but they respond to the economic pressures to do otherwise. The economic rules of the business game (especially in America) focus on the single metric of money, so maximizing that single dimension results in cancerous growth that doesn't consi
For godsakes don't take the bait (Score:2)
There have been a steady stream of articles asking questions along these lines trying to get people to reveal what they are working on. Don't do it. It will only be used against you.
If you have something with potential of being even mildly disruptive and your end goal isn't cashing out then for god sakes keep your mouth shut until your shit is ready.
The worst problems have already been solved (Score:4, Interesting)
Technology has already solved most of the world's worse problems - sanitation, water purification, food production, vaccines, health care, birth control, basic education, etc are all "solved" problems, but the implementation is not a technological problem, it's a social and political one. It's not even a case where it just takes more money since more money largely ends up being misdirected.
Political muscle and being taken seriously. (Score:2)
We are not taken seriously for what we do because we don't have organizations acting on our behalf to look after our interests at a political level.
If we had that then when representations were needed on important decisions like infrastructure, education, employment conditions, research and development - a relevant organization would be there to respond. It's our failure to recognise that as individuals, we don't look after each other as a group. The consequence of that our common interests are treated li
I have a contribution (Score:2)
BGF, or binary graph format. My invention. A revolutionary new way to represent graphs (i.e., the mathematical structure known as graphs). File layout = memory layout: a bgf file can be loaded as-is into memory. Even in Java, if you load bgf into off-heap memory, graph traversal time can be as low as 20 nanoseconds/edge, when using bgf. If anybody knows a problem that can be stated as a graph problem, and where extremely fast graph processing makes the world a better place, ping me.
Because . . . (Score:2)
They are not in charge.
Reality Check (Score:2)
Solving big problems is a great way to get yourself summarily dismissed as a nutcase. There was a doctor back in the 60's who said the evidence presuming a cause/effect relationship between cholesterol and heart disease was flat-out wrong.
He was practically disbarred.
Just today I heard that the manufacturers of Tylenol will have to put a warning on the bottle about drinking and taking it. Check out the death toll from people who didn't know any better.
There are many other examples, mainly in medicine and
Most techies have no real free will to do so (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well most 'technies' are also unable to solve any decently complicated problems because of incompetence.
You don't need to be a good software developer to write the 457th version of Candy Crush, but you may need to be one to actually solve an important problem.
I mean there would be lots of things like building a secure mobile device. The problem is that your average "Java jockey" won't understand that their desire to make everything complicated is part of the security problem.
Also most problems in the world
This headline can fuck right off (Score:5, Insightful)
Ask Slashdot: Why Aren't Techies Improving The World?
Slashdot reader marmot7 isn't impressed by "the latest app that solves some made up problem. I'm impressed by apps that solve real problems..."
Jesus Christ. If the first thing you think of when talking about solving the world's most problems is apps, I don't want you on the funding committee.
FSF (Score:3)
Or how about the EFF defending people's rights online. Helping educate people about the importance of encryption and stopping big business from tracking your every move.
Has wikipedia not become a central source of free information the world over? Has wikileaks not provided a safehaven for whistleblowers the world over?
Techies have done a lot for the world in the last 10 years.
Tech is not the solution to everything (Score:3)
If you want to change the world, try to change your neighborhood for a start. Be nice to people. Even if your are not able to change the world, you can make some places on it nicer and some people happier.
Choose the solution, it may be technical, or not. Tech people know how to create stuff, investigate issues and solve problems. These are fine assets to change what sucks around you.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
There are no heroes. It steam engines when it comes steam-engine time. You feed the kid because it's the right thing to do.
Re: (Score:2)
They work like this: there's a problem costing the public money, whether that's in cash or years of life lost due to illness or whatever. Fix it, prove you did (that's the hard part), and collect a percentage of the money you saved.
There is another tool to solve these things: the market. Its designed in a way so that solutions with a low cost are prefferred over solutions with a high cost. The problem in many cases though are externalities [wikipedia.org] which introduce an imperfection to the market by not making some costs show up in the price tag of products on the market, thus making those products more competitive and maybe more likely to be chosen than alternative products that do not cause such hidden costs.
To solve this, externalities can be
Re:What do you want us to do? (Score:5, Informative)
Not that guy, but one company which springs to mind immediately is HGSI. They cured AIDS, were bought out by Glaxo-Kline-Smith and all their research was shelved because GKS has a treatment-for-life product which a cure would have made obsolete.
Yeah, except that's not true at all. HGSI had a ccr5 monoclonal antibody in clinical trials, but it hadn't shown itself to be as effective as other existing medications let alone constituting having "cured AIDS". And Glaxo has been working on ccr5 agonists of their own (e.g aplavoric), with similarly mixed results.
There's a ton of money and prestige in an AIDS cure, there's no way a pharmaceutical company would submarine it.
And Glaxo and HGSI were beaten to the punch on CCR5 agonists by Pfizer, who got FDA approval for maraviroc (brand: Selzentry) and are making millions off of it.
Re: (Score:3)
Shelving an AIDS cure makes no sense.
Aside of being the company that cured AIDS, which alone would make the share value go through the roof, this is the license to print money. Instantly EVERYTHING your competitor has in that field is worthless. Why treat if you have the cure? Second, it's more likely to be paid for by European state insurances. For this to understand, you have to know how they work. Basically (VERY roughly simplified) they pay for cures more easily than for continuous treatments. Basically